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kimonobeat · 6 years

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aiko bon: Official “Chiisana Marui Koujitsu” liner notes

aiko’s major label debut album, released April 21, 1999. The title of the album comes from a line in the first song, “Orange na Mangetsu”.

Orange na Mangetsu (オレンジな満月; Orange Full Moon)

Jet (ジェット)

Shiseikatsu (私生活; Private Life)

Utahime (歌姫; Diva)

Akai Kutsu (赤い靴; Red Shoes)

Ijiwaru na Tenshi yo Sekai wo Warae! (イジワルな天使よ世界を笑え!; Mean Angel, Laugh at the World!)

Koi Ochiru Toki (恋墜ちる時; When You Fall in Love)

Natsu ni Muffler (夏にマフラー; Scarf in Summer)

Bob (ボブ)

Naki Mushi (ナキ・ムシ; Cry Baby)

Ashita (あした; Tomorrow)

(Thank you parasmichael for the commission!)

☑ The album as a whole

This was in 1999. When we were making this album I was sorta overwhelmed by just how awesome everything was: “Wow, a studio! Wow, a mic! Wow, oh my gosh, Tokyo!” We didn’t have just one set recording studio either; we recorded in a few different places. Plus, I didn’t have much time because I was still commuting from Osaka then. Because of that, my mental picture of recording it is that it was all pretty much over in the blink of an eye. There’s parts where my voice sounds nasally because we recorded when my vocals weren’t in great condition. (laughs) Oh, and it feels very ‘early’, doesn’t it? Back then I thought it was better to sing everything with force. Like, personally I don’t think you should sing very sharply or shrilly when the song itself is mild, but I used to think the stronger the better. I didn’t know a lot about laying off at certain points in the lyrics back then. What a trip down memory lane.

☑ Orange na Mangetsu

One thing I don’t really like is when people call this song “Oraman”. (laughs) I’m happy people even know this song exists enough to call it that, though. It was the opening theme song for the late-night Tokyo TV show “Gekkan Chikyuu TV (Monthly Earth TV)”. We shot a video for it thereーa sort of music video, if you will. It’s a rare video. I don’t even have it. Thanks to that, I had the chance to perform the song “Utahime” on the show. Back then I was up to my ears in work, so I appeared on the show covered in mud. I’m actually afraid of the moon. You know how sometimes you see it all big and amber-colored up in the sky? A long time ago, I often used to get so scared of seeing a big moon in the sky that I would cry. I’m still afraid of it to this day. I’m really scared that it’ll fall out of the sky or something. The song’s about how I want so badly for my feelings to be understood that I even go as far as to fearfully get a glimpse of it through the gap in my curtains and make a wish, even though I’m so scared of the moon. I used to be such a weakling back then. I used antiseptic for my throat so much that people would say my place smelled like a hospital when they came over. That’s why the word ‘antiseptic’ appears in the lyrics. The album title ‘chiisana marui koujitsu (a nice calm little day)’ appears in the lyrics too. I think that phrase represents what I personally consider to be a happy day well. I still find myself hoping that every single day continues to be full of happy things like these. Another thing I don’t really like was when this one comedian pronounced it as “Chiisana Marui Koupi”. It’s “Koujitsu”, not “Koupi!” Kind of feels like the album kicks off with drums, doesn’t it?

☑ Jet

Okay, first of all… Right around the time Shimayan had finished up the arrangement, I went over to his house and we recorded some vocals as a sort of demo. I was so happy when I listened that tape. I listened to it while running through Sangenjaya by myself. It just kinda made me feel like running. Like, “WE DID IIIIIIIT!” Anyway, I was running, and it felt so good that I knew then and there that this song would be a hit. It just felt so good when I was running that it felt done to me. It gets people really excited at my concerts, too. I guess the “d-dun!” part has a lot of impact. I also use the pronoun ‘boku (masculine ‘I’) in the song too, which is rare for me. The boy in “Jet” and the boy in “Boushi to Mizugi to Suiheisen” are one and the same. So the hair sticking out of the back of the girl’s hat is all messy and curled upーthat’s what the line “Because the messy hair on the back of your head are your wings” means. He’s looking at the hair sticking out of the back of the girl’s capーy’know, those messy hairs that are all over the placeーand looking at the way she lives her life, how incredibly free she is and how she really enjoys every single day of her life, and he sort of admires her for that. That’s why you also see the line “I know for sure you’ll fly” in the lyrics too. I guess I included it after it all just popped into my head once I came up with that visual because this song, “Jet” and “Boushi” are all especially candid. There are others like that too.

☑ Shiseikatsu

I’m really fond of the title and kept saying I wanted to make it the title of the album. Then when I was writing the title track, I was afraid of making the overall vibe of the album into just one thing and gave it up. When you write a title track, the radio stations definitely play the title track on the air. I didn’t really like the idea that the title track would set the image of the entire album even though there were all these other songs on it, you know what I mean? Now I get what everyone was saying to me then. Back then I didn’t understand why at all. Now I’m like, “Oh, so that’s why.” I definitely feel the things I wrote about in the lyrics. It’s an established part of me that I’m a bit afraid of, and because it kinda like, expresses that part of me to a T, I decided to call it “Private Life”. The one thing I really remember about this song was when the bridge over my molars came off when I had my very first solo concert at Nest in Shibuya. I stuck them back on with Poligrip. (laughs) Using Poligrip for the very first time at 23 years old. That was when I first learned that Poligrip was clear. You know how it’s always pink when you see it on TV? When I found out, I thought I’d made some kind of huge discovery and mentioned it during the MC portion of my concertーthat I was using Poligrip and it was clear! I showed everybody. They all went, “Whoa!!!” When I sang “Shiseikatsu” during that Poligrip concert, there was this one girl who was so stoked that she was dancing like she was at a club or something. I remember seeing her and singing while thinking to myself, “Oh wow… That makes me happy to see! I’m gonna keep working hard then!” I also really love the ad-libbing that doesn’t follow the melody at all, and also the ad-libbing in the second half of the song.

☑ Utahime

This is another one of those songs that stands out more than I ever thought it would. A lot of my fans tells me they like this song. Probably because I suddenly started sang this song during the opening of my first time on the national net show “All Night Nippon R” along with the line, “Nice to meet you. I’m aiko, who are you?” Because of that, some people found out about me for the first time through this song and not one of my singles. The people on the radio station really liked “Utahime”, so they asked me to sing it. Everyone gets super excited when I sing it at concerts, too. I still feel like this song’s gotten a lot more mileage than I ever thought it would. But, I’d like to be the kind of singer who’s able to surpass this song so I can continue singing in the future. This is one of those songs that I feel like I need to sing any time I sing at a concert. It was in the program at the concert when I developed those nodules [on my vocal chords]. When I sang the part that goes, “I might cry and cry~”, I couldn’t get the ‘and’ out. That was really painful for me. I figured everything’d be fine if I could just hit that note, but I definitely couldn’t. That was a huge shock for me. Singing this song used to make me feel super sad. I just couldn’t get over how shocked I was about it. Any time I thought about singing this song, the memory of it overpowered the song itself. The song makes me feel really sad, but also happy. I still hope I can be like the person in the song soon.

☑ Akai Kutsu See liner notes for ‘Naki Mushi’ single

☑ Ijiwaru na Tenshi yo Sekai wo Warae

Okay, so another thing I don’t really like (laughs) is when people call this song “Iji Ten”. Sounds like ikaten, doesn’t it? Like some kind of fried food, right? Sounds like a fried fish cake or something like that. I’ve always called it “Tenshi” which is the usual, but some people call it “Iji Ten”. There’s also a part in this song where I put my hands up in the air along with everyone in the audience. I never thought I’d get pretty much everyone to do it. I used to hope that writing this song would help me enjoy myself at concerts. I used to be really bad at writing cheerful songs in the beginning. I write my songs using my piano, and the more I try to sing in-tempo, the more I try to play the rhythm on my keyboard and the harder it gets hard for me to sing. It’s like my right hand’s flipping things with a spatula and my left hand’s doing shabu-shabu or something… But I really wanted to write an up-tempo song. That was my task, an up-tempo song. It still is. So yeah, that’s how this song came to be. I think I’ve been doing this song at concerts since my indie days, maybe. I remember doing the peace sign and thumbs-up since before I had my solo concert. After I debuted, I appeared at this event in Tokyo called “The Freedom Fool Fry”. I was there with about 4 supporting bands. It was my very first time performing in Tokyoーit was a great place to be a nobody, although I was there because they’d asked me to come. I was super happy to see everyone shuffle out there to see me. I was like, “Wow, people in Tokyo are so dang kind~” (laughs) Now a lot of people know the signs. Seeing that from the stage is one of the highlights of the show. It’s just super neat. It almost doesn’t feel over ‘til they do it. Anytime I leave this song off the setlist people always write, “Not doin’ it this time?” on the surveys. The melody moves around a lot in this song and key’s pretty high, so it’s a fight every time. Like, I wanna move around, but I also wanna sing. You know? It’s a fight to the finish every single time, one where everyone who came to the venue is grappling with that ‘seize the day!’ feeling.

☑ Koi Ochiru Toki

My voice was real nasally then. I almost think it might be a good thing when I listen to it now, but the song reminds me how frustrated I was with it at the time. I caught a cold while recording. This was back when I didn’t worry at all about what state my throat was in either, so I slept until about 5 minutes before I had to sing because I had both a cold and a fever. Then they woke me up, I got up, and sang. People told me that they didn’t understand the lyrics of this one song in particular. (laughs) “What’s square foam?” they asked. It’s hard having people ask what things are. I was like, “Don’t ask about every single lil’ thing!” (laughs) In my head, I imagine ‘when you fall in love’ as something impossible happening. That’s what I think falling in love is. You’ve got all these things swirling around in your head. Things are like a cartoon, or a comic stripーthat’s what ‘when you fall in love’ is like to me, so that’s what I wrote about. You feel it with your entire body, you inhale their scent. I was super shocked when I sang it at a concert for the first time in a while and everyone sang along. They had me worrying that I’d mess the lyrics up!

☑ Natsu ni Muffler

So hot it’s like wearing a scarf in the summerーthat’s what I was going for here! I’m expressing the way you feel when you like somebody. I feel like I don’t do anything that sounds even remotely like this now. It’s pretty refreshing, I like it a lot. The more I listened to this song, the more I fell in love with it. I mean, I’m the one who wrote it and all, but… When you listen to something, over time you gradually start seeing new sides to it. Like, I love how expressive the melody is, and I love how the feeling of being purely happy comes through well. I love the phrase “Lemme see the tan lines your watch left behind”ーit’s very realistic.

☑ Bob

I’m the one playing in this song, tee hee. (laughs) Hm, where’d I sing this again? Hitokuchizaka, maybe… ? It came together pretty much instantly so I said, “Hey, I wrote this song.” I remember recording it after showing it to them at Hitokuchizaka Studio and being told it sounded good. You can really tell it was fresh off the press when I recorded it too. Wow, that really takes me back! I sound like I’m saying “I sink” instead of “I think”, “mot” instead of “not”, and all the words are the kind you’d use in school. Thanks to this song, anytime I get letters people write ��I sink” instead. I used to write it that way a lot myself, actually. My hair really was cut into a bob when I made this song. That’s why I wrote it! In this song I’m really trying hard to act tough. I’m just talking to myself but wish someone was listening… but I’m also acting tough. That’s because I feel that way 24/7. (laughs) Oh, and the Wurlitzer is just fantastic, isn’t it?

☑ Naki Mushi See liner notes for ‘Naki Mushi’ single

☑ Ashita See liner notes for ‘Ashita’ single

#aiko #aiko yanai #yanai aiko #chiisana marui koujitsu #translation #aiko bon

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kimonobeat · 6 years

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aiko bon: Official “Naki Mushi” liner notes

aiko’s 2nd major label single, released on March 3, 1999. The title track was the first to be written and composed by aiko.

Naki Mushi (ナキ・ムシ; Cry Baby)

Akai Kutsu (赤い靴; Red Shoes)

Nijigoro (二時頃; Around 2:00)

Naki Mushi (instrumental version)

(Thank you parasmichael for the commission!)

☑ Naki Mushi

They told me to write a song because I’d be releasing a single. I wrote and wrote but all they said was, “Hmmm.” I was so worried about what to do… They kept saying “Hmmm” to all the songs I made. I thought they’d turned this song down too, and the way they tilted their heads and said it wasn’t the right timing for this or that song made me think they’d turned them all downーthey didn’t communicate that well to me. That was the only time I’ve ever felt like quitting since I debuted as a singer. (laughs) I was like, “If it’s gonna be this hard to sing, then I don’t really need to sing.” I thought to myself, with tears in my eyes, that I couldn’t keep on going if things were going to be so un-enjoyable. That singing’s supposed to be fun for me, so what do I do now? I’d lost sight of what I wanted to say with my music. But then they told me there’s no point in doing any of this if I wasn’t having any fun, and that they’d back me up through thick and thin. This is the song I came up with afterwards. The thought I had in my head while writing “Naki Mushi” was that I wasn’t writing a song for a single, I needed to write the kind of songs I wanted to sing. I was commuting to Tokyo at the time, and remember crying while talking to about it at the management office in Sangenjaya. “This is so much easier now. No need to worry anymore.” I felt like I could write whatever I wanted. I’m so glad they said that to me then. We all kept getting burned while shooting the music video. I kept saying, “Hot!” while lighting the candles. I was wearing my own clothes in the video, and my friends came from Osaka to be the band members. I wrote the lyrics while watching steam coming out of my humidifier. I bought a humidifier for the very first time when I moved into this place in Osaka called Higashi Mikuni. My singer friends told me I needed a humidifier, so then I got one to keep at my house. I wrote the song while watching the steam coming from the humidifier and thinking about how pretty it was. It also was based on my life up to that point. I cry a lot, so much that I’ve been trying to cry less lately. This song’s about how I cry so often that I try not to cry right off the bat.

☑ Akai Kutsu (Red Shoes)

I pretty much only wear sneakers. It’s basically all sneakers at my house. I bought red sandals just once because it was summertime, some high-soled ones. I rolled up my jeans, went barefoot, and even gave myself a cute manicure so I could wear then. And I did. But my feet hurt, and they were coldーthere wasn’t a single good thing about them, honestly. So then I wrote this song. I think everything new I try out is rooted in me hoping that the person I like will think better of me for it. It backfires on me and then collects dust… But I did it! There’s always been this one person I can't stop thinking aboutーsomeone who reminds me of things. They’re the one I was thinking of when I wrote this song. I really like the intro. I just love it. That was around the time I was sort of like, cramming lyrics into songs. (laughs) I wasn’t able to write a song unless I did that. The song changes intervals a lot and there’s so many words crammed in. I was often told I tried to cram in too much.

☑ Nijigoro

I was awake in the middle of the night and sleeping in the morning back then, especially right before I debutedーI’d go to bed in the morning, wake up in the evening, watch reruns of “GeGeGe no Kitaro” sometime around 4 AM. Then I was awake for the day. That was my life in Osaka up until I started getting pretty busy. Like this song goes, I used to make a lot of phone calls in the middle of the night. The room I moved into would get really chilly and cold, so I’d make phone calls while sitting on the floor, holding my knees to my chest. There just wasn’t anywhere to get warm there. I’d make phone calls ‘cause it was cold outsideーand there was this guy I really liked, right? I’d just talk like usual because I couldn’t bring myself to ask him anything. I was so scared that I couldn’t ask him if he liked anyone, or if he had a girlfriend. I knew he didー100%, for sureーbut I couldn’t bring myself to ask, and he never mentioned anything about it. I knew but couldn’t say it. So then I wrote this song. It makes me really happy that this song is a hidden favorite with my fans. I’m so glad everyone’s listening to it, ‘cause coupling tracks like this one sometimes don’t end up seeing the light of day!! This was the 3rd part of the saga about my new place. (laughs)

#aiko #aiko yanai #yanai aiko #chiisana marui koujitsu #translation #aiko bon

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kimonobeat · 6 years

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aiko bon: Official“Ashita” liner notes

aiko’s major label debut single, released on July 17, 1998. The title track is the only song in aiko’s discography that was not composed by aiko herself.

Ashita (あした; tomorrow)

I'm feeling blue

Ashita (instrumental)

(Thank you parasmichael for the commission!)

☑ Ashita

Wow, this really takes me back! “We’re looking for someone to sing the theme song for a movie. Why not give it a try?” they said. I really thought I was just participating in the project as the vocalist. I found out right in the middle of recording that this would be my debut song, about a month before my debut. In my head I’d always imagined that I’d tell my parents, “Mom, Dad, I’ve been signed to a major label~!” and they’d say, “I’m glad to hear that!” But what really happened was, I called them in a hotel room I don’t even really remember and said, “Uh, apparently I’m debuting?” My parents were also just like, “Oh, well, I see. That’s nice.” I ended up being very hesitant to make my debut. One of the reasons I was so hesitant was that it wasn’t one of my own songs. “Ashita” is the only song I’ve ever written by request before or since then. It was a movie for kids named “Toilet no Hanako-san”, so I was told not to write anything too difficult. They asked me to use words that were easy to understand. I wasn’t sure how to even do that. I was also really nervous about making it because I’d never written lyrics to someone else’s music before, but they gave them the OK. Then we recorded it, which was also its own big ordeal. “Ad-lib like Mariah,” they said. I was like, “Huh?!? But I CAN’T!!” (laughs) It was so rough, I would’ve fallen over if I hadn’t been holding onto the music stand. I sang the same part of the chorus over and over and over again. I also remember being nearly in tears because they put hot pink lipstick on me when doing the photo shoot for the cover. And the lights gave me a sunburn, so half my body was bright red. Oh, but they bought me a Gameboy. (laughs) A lot of things happen. But thanks to the fact that I debuted with this song, my hometown of Osaka showed me a lot of support and I managed to sell a few copies, so I re-signed my contract with Pony Canyon. Part of me was unsure of what to do because it was the first time I’d ever sung anything that sounded like that. Thinking about it now, though, Komorita (Minoru) was able to get me to do things I’d never done before on that song. I’m thankful for that now. The original PV for this song also isn’t included on any of my current DVDs. The old one had a bunch of clips from the “Toilet no Hanako-san” movie in it, so at the end you see a shot of an Okiku doll. After the Okiku doll gets up, I appear with the same hairstyle. Some people higher up at Pony Canyon snickered that people would mistake the doll for me. (laughs) But shooting that music video was tons of fun. They let me move and sing any way I wanted to. I feel like I looked so much older back then, when I watch it now. Like, “Hold on, what’s this all about?” My hair’s long in it too.

☑ I’m feeling blue

I wrote this song a while ago. This was one of the songs I recorded in Machida. This one really makes me feel like, “Wow, debuting really is a step into the unknown, huh?” Having all these people participate in songs I’d done with just my vocals and a piano adds a lot to them, you know? Sometimes they turn out sounding different, and sometimes when they’re done, they’re not at all what I expected them to do with it. On this song, I’d only ever played it with just a piano up until that point, so I had this image in my head that it would just be a piano. Honestly, I couldn’t get used to hearing the drums and bass in the song at first. I remember slowly getting accustomed to it, then adding in some ad-libbing a little bit here and there. Shimayan has been producing my stuff since my indie days, so by then we’d started talking a little bit more. I just can’t bring myself to go through other people. I can’t get out everything I want to sayーI’m really bad about it. At the time, I wasn’t able to communicate what I wanted 100%. I was only about 20 when I did this, you know? I barely had enough songs to even bother counting ‘cause this was in the super early years of my career. It reminds me of the crushes I had back then. I wrote the song while not quite sure how to express the way I felt towards someone I really liked, so it makes me reflect back on it. I didn’t get to go to the movies with them like I did in the lyrics, though. Well, we didn’t go to the moviesーwe went to the beach. (laughs)

#aiko #yanai aiko #aiko yanai #aiko bon #chiisana marui koujitsu #translation

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kimonobeat · 6 years

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aiko bon “Profile Interview” Chapter 6 (3/3)

ーWhat songs did you contribute to the CD, aiko?

aiko: 3 songs: “Ano Ko e (For Her)”, “more&more”, and “AB-Gata no Futari (Us Two Type AB People)”. “Ano Ko e” ended up being one of the B-sides to “Rosie” later on. “more&more” is also a B-side on “Sakura no Toki”, but I sang it with a completely different sort of bossa nova vibe. Then there’s “AB-Gata no Futari”, which I haven’t included on anything yet. The key of that song is super duper high for me to sing, now. “Once a week I call him out of love~ Even though I’ve never said the words ‘I like you’ out loud~ I call him~” I used falsetto to sing that entire part.

ーYou were just fine singing in that key at the time, though?

aiko: No, it was still pretty high for me even then. (smiles wryly) But singing songs in a high key gave me so much status back then. All I did was write songs in super high keys because it made me so happy to hear people go, “Wow, that’s so high! Amazing!” For example, “Aitsu wo Mukaseru Houhou” starts off with me singing on the CD, but the old version actually started with me libbing some high notesーyou know, “Yeah yeah yeah~”, that sort of thing. It was super high-pitched. I tried to sing it again for real and was like, “Huh!?” (laughs) “AB-Gata no Futari” has this nice jazzy sound to it. It’s a song about how these two people whose blood types are both AB fall in love. It only takes them 3 hours to fall in love, but half a year to express their feelings to each other. I’d love to sing this song again.

ーHow did you arrange those 3 songs? Did you form a band for it?

aiko: They were all really simple, I sang accompanied only by a piano. Like, one of my friends from music school played the piano for me, and I sang.

ーAnd then after that was your very first indies release, “astral box”, which was your first solo work.

aiko: Yes, that’s right. We recorded it in this studio in Machida named Dutch Mama. It was called Dutch Mama because it was in Machida. Get it? Dutch Mama, Machida, Dutch Mama… I-I’m sorry, that was rude. (laughs) That mini-album had 5 songs on it, including “DO YOU THINK ABOUT ME?”, “Hikari no Sasu Ashimoto (Where the Light Hits Your Feet)”, and “HOW TO LOVE”, all of which have yet to make it onto any of my major label CDs. I’ve released the other two, “Power of Love” and “Kiss de Okoshite (Wake Me with a Kiss)”. The director, Mr. Chiba, said I absolutely just had to release “DO YOU THINK ABOUT ME?” right this moment. That said, he’s said that about a lot of songs by now. It’s like, “So Chiba, when is ‘this moment’ exactly?” (laughs)

ーBut since you were writing songs constantly after your talent agency president told you to, I’m guessing it wasn’t that much of a struggle to come up with songs when he asked you to make an album?

aiko: Uhhh, I think I had about 15 at that point. I was painfully slow at writing songs back then compared to the pace I go at now, so I think that was about how many I had in stock. Of those, we chose a few and then Shimayan (Shimada Masanori) recorded the arrangement digitally on a keyboard. I think I might’ve been a little bit nasty to him when I first met him. I mean, that was pretty much the first time I ever had anyone arrange my songs, and it really surprised me when he added all of these different sounds to songs I’d based around a piano. When he asked me what I thought about the arrangement, I didn’t give him very many positive replies. “How come this sounds Chinese?” I’d say. “I don’t get what that sound’s for there.” At the time, I pretty much hated everything about it.

ーWasn’t that the height of MIDI music, though?

aiko: Yeah, but I wasn’t a huge fan of the way it sounds. I was also sick and tired of it because everything under the sun had a MIDI arrangement back then, so I was like, “Wait, MY songs are all gonna have a MIDI arrangement too!?” I had a pretty strong reaction to it. But even though I thought I hated all things MIDI, when we worked on my 2nd indies release there were other times when I thought, “Wow, I had no idea it could sound like that… Cool!” My hate for MIDI arrangements totally vanished right then and there. I still feel like I caused Shimayan a lot of trouble because I just couldn’t accept it the first time. (laughs)

ーDid recording the vocals go smoothly?

aiko: I sang them all so seriously. We recorded 3 songs a day, or something like that. Now that I think about it, it’s pretty incredible that we were able to record so many! We went at a pace of 3 songs a day, choruses and all. I sang the same song over and over and OVER again because I didn’t know I didn’t have to, like, sing the song all the way through. I was so serious about all of themー”I sang a lot today and got it recorded.” (laughs) When I listen to it now, I can’t help but be bothered by the fact that I can hear the pitch wobble here and there, and that I’m not keeping the rhythm well. I’m able to keep a rhythm and sing on pitch now, but not I wonder if I’d be able to sing so animatedly now. It’s so complicated. I feel like I’m asking for too much, you know?

ーSo how was recording as a whole?

aiko: It was fun, but definitely exhausting. You see, I was commuting from Osaka. I still had my radio jobs in Osaka so I came and went in-between. Seeing a CD come together bit by bit made me so happy, though. You know how you get a sample of the cover and such before the CD is complete? I remember putting it in a color CD case. I put the back cover in the case and was like, “Wow, so that’s what it’s gonna look like!” That made me so happy. We did talk about that cover looking like it had blood all over it though. (smiles wryly) I also didn’t know anything about the ‘eye’ in ‘eye make-up’ at the time, so my eyebrows were bushy, I’d never worn mascara before, and I absolutely hated curling my eyelashes with an eyelash curler. ...Man am I being super harsh. (laughs)

ーYou the followed that up by releasing your 1st indies single “Hachimitsu (Honey)” roughly 5 months later, and then your 2nd indies mini-album “GIRLIE”.

aiko: Right. It all happened so fast after I released “astral box”. And I was really exhausted because I was still commuting from Osaka to Tokyo like always. Of the 5 songs on “GIRLIE”, I’ve released “Ijiwaru na Tenshi yo Sekai wo Warae! (Mean Angel, Laugh at the World!)” and “Rosie” after signing to a major label, as well as “Hachimitsu”. I still haven’t released the 2 songs “Inu ni Naru (I’ll Be a Dog)” and “Sasenaide (Don’t Make Me)” since going major, though. But man oh man, the cover for “GIRLIE”... just yikes. (laughs)

ーI don’t think it’s that bad.

aiko: I haaate it. For real, I do. It’s almost kinda funnyーlike, who is that even? My face is so chubby. (laughs) I made the pants I’m wearing in that picture myself; I cut my hair all by myself too. A friend came over to my house and gave me that bushy perm. We didn’t even use rods to curl my hair, we used pencils. That picture is just SO embarrassing…

ーDid you get the offer to debut under a major label with the movie theme song “Ashita (Tomorrow)” around the time you were working on “GIRLIE”?

aiko: I think so. We talked about it sometime in April, and then I debuted in July. I thought I would just be participating as the vocalist at first, though. I was really shocked to find out that I’d be releasing as a CD under the name ‘aiko’. For real, I was like, “...Wait, what!?” It wasn’t my songーwell, I wrote the lyrics myself, but they had a lot of requests. They said things like, “Kids are going to be listening to this” and “Don’t use difficult words, please”, which I whined about. That was the first time I’d ever listened to a composition and written lyrics for it too, since I tend to write songs starting with the lyrics first. Because of all that, I wasn’t really sure how to feel about it. In the end, I sort of just did it because the president of my talent agency said I didn’t have anything to lose by doing it. I didn’t care much either way. To be really honest, I didn’t have a clue. I honestly had no clue whether to OK it or not…

ーSounds like you were having a hard time making a decision. It wasn’t even a song you’d composed.

aiko: Yeah, exactly. And when I went to record it, there were people chit-chatting in English to each other, talking about the equipment, and I didn’t get their Tokyo sense of humor at all. It felt like I was in a foreign country. I slept in the corner of the studio with a knitted hat pulled all the way down past my nose. (laughs) They were very painstakingly detailed about choosing which take to use for like, the chorus, so I had to sing the same parts multiple times. It left me so beat that I almost had to hold onto the music stand to stand. Part of it was because I wasn’t used to being in the studio yet, I think, but that was also a pretty demanding recording.

ーBe honest, how did you feel when “Ashita” was released?

aiko: It didn’t really sink in. It didn’t feel like I’d ‘debuted’ at all. It didn’t even feel like it was ‘my’ song. I thought it was just going to be a one-shot thing. A little after I’d made my debut, people at [Pony] Canyon were telling me all the time that they honestly didn’t know who I was. (laughs) I was still living in Osaka, and the only information they had on me was this tiny A4-size flyer. Apparently they weren’t aware I existed even after I’d debuted. The Canyon people in Tokyo of all places were saying, “aiko? What’s that? Oh, she’s debuted? Who is she?”, which meant the locals definitely didn’t know who I was. We did a campaign to help with that, but even then we only went to Okayama and Matsuyama. I went with someone from Canyon since it didn’t cost me anything, did our campaign, ate some food. And then on the way home that person said, “I need to go to another campaign event. You think you can make it home on your own?” I said yes and took a plane home by myself. (laughs)

ーThat sounds like a pretty sad story.

aiko: But then FM OSAKA worked really hard and put “Ashita” on power rotation. There was also this guy over at FM Toyama named Kawakado. He was close to someone named Komorita who promoted my song a lot, so it was played heavily there too. It sold some copies thanks to those 2 stations. It sold maybe 20k or 30k copies in Osaka and Toyama, which got the Canyon people in Tokyo to go, “Hm? What’s this all about? Who’s this aiko girl?” And then it wasn’t a one-shot thing anymore. We started talking about signing a contract. I really feel like FM OSAKA and FM Toyama putting the song on power rotation was huge for me. FM OSAKA in particular really supported me.

ーWere you still the DJ for “Count Down Kansai Top 40” at FM OSAKA when you debuted?

aiko: I was. I even said “I made my debut!” while I was on air. (laughs) The time frame was changed to Saturdays late at night from 2 AM until 5 AMーa promotion! (laughs) The show had to be put on hold every now and then to check the broadcast equipment, but since I was generating some numbers, they decided to give me a live broadcast from 2 to 5 AM on Saturdays. I started getting more and more faxes and emails.

ーSince you’d just debuted at the time, right?

aiko: Right. The radio station was really supportive. I wouldn’t be where I am today without the radio station. That’s how much they all supported me. It felt like I had a bunch of moms and dadsーit still feels that way.

ーIt still feels like you have so many people supporting you, from the radio, to your fans, and all the various members of the staff, you mean?

aiko: Mm-hm. So many people have shown me so much support.　I’m able to continue releasing CDs by… by selling a few copies here and there. I see that now.